SHELLEY
Noblest and bravest of the sons of song!
Most selfless and most single-hearted friend
Of the unfriended sufferers of wrong:
Too eager for his peace the world to mend:
Alas! he knew not men, how hard of heart,
How dim of apprehension, slow to move,
How vain it was to think he could impart
To them his zeal for truth, his boundless love!
His life was but a brief and fevered dream,
But such a dream as he alone could know:
And wisdom at the end began to stream
Upon him with a mild and steady glow:
Alas! that death should then his victim claim,
Even in that hour when he himself became!
Most selfless and most single-hearted friend
Of the unfriended sufferers of wrong:
Too eager for his peace the world to mend:
Alas! he knew not men, how hard of heart,
How dim of apprehension, slow to move,
How vain it was to think he could impart
To them his zeal for truth, his boundless love!
His life was but a brief and fevered dream,
But such a dream as he alone could know:
And wisdom at the end began to stream
Upon him with a mild and steady glow:
Alas! that death should then his victim claim,
Even in that hour when he himself became!